Today on the show, we're talking about real life metal heads! These animals are literally metal, reinforcing their bodies with metallic armor. From spiders, to snails, to waspy tails, you don't want to find yourself on the bad side of these tough as nails critters. Discover this and more as we answer the age-old question: are figs vegan?
Guest: Tom Reimann
Footnotes: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1nEg3DpNzk38zrlUGQJebbTxx7RmXH8y_L5dr4H8Acd8/edit?usp=sharing
Hey guys. Quick programming note. Next week I'm going to be taking a little break gotta get some Katie time in, but I will return the following week with a brand new episode of Creature feature. Also in this episode, in the Metal, Tom's audio had a little bit of an issue, but it gets better after about fifteen minutes, so uh, sorry about that. Thank you guys so much for listening, and happy New Year. Please enjoy this very awesome metal episode. Welcome to Creature Future production of I Heart Radio. I'm your host of Many Parasites, Katie Golden. I studied psychology and evolutionary biology, and today on the show we're talking about real life metal heads or metal butts. I guess these animals are literally metal, reinforcing their bodies with metallic armor. From spiders to snails to waspy tales. You don't want to find yourself on the bound side of these tough as nailed critters. Discover this and more as we answer the age old question our figs. Vegan joining me today is front of the show Friend of Me and host of many shows on the game Fully Unemployed Network. Tom Ryman. Welcome and at least as many parasites probably more. I like to think of myself as a welcoming host of parasitic organisms. It's not a competition, right, Like, you know we we can both have a ton of parasites. Well, I mean now it is like, now that you've said that, I feel like it is a competition. So I'm gonna go. I'm gonna go roll in some filth. Yeah, I'm gonna like playing a little dumpster apartment complex. Get a microscope and pick through my eyelashes and count how many demodets I have in there, eat my skin flake. Oh yeah, I'm gonna go steal some pillow cases from a motel. Then I'll be the winner. No, hey, thanks for having me on. Yeah, you're you're very well. I am actually in shock and disbelief. I haven't had you on before. We've tried. I know that there has been one or two occasions for the time difference. It's just like, couldn't quite make it happen, but yeah, making it happen. Now, that's pretty slippery customer. I'm a slippery parasite. Yeah, there you go. Um, but yeah, it doesn't doesn't quite make sense, but we'll go with it. If you want your words, your words not mine. Listen, it's early my time. So the parasites that actually make you function haven't woken up yet exactly. They're still they're still jet legged. The brain worms that are really in control of the show, they're all still drowsy, getting their little tiny cups of coffee inside your brain flesh. So, Tom, are you a fan of metal? Yeah? Actually yeah, we'll name metal. Name name a metal if you're such a metal I mean, you know, it's obviously Metallico. They were sort of right having their big comeback when I was in middle school. Um, so that was like a big band for me, like just listening on like school trips or sports trips or whatever. Um. Really it's um, I got really into uh the show metal Ocalypse. Yeah. I actually really like music. Yeah, Like he's like legitimately good. It's like actually good. Yeah yeah, you know, like Slayer, Yeah, stuff like that. I appreciate how um and it's it's actually more so my wife Marina than me. She's like really into it. Um, there's it's there's something really nerdy about it, like the amount of math that's involved and playing really good metal. Yeah, it's really funny because it is to me. I mean, I when I was a kid, I used to love classical music, so you could tell I was very very popular as a child. Um. But as an adult, yeah, I do. I do like metal because of a lot of the classical elements to it. There's it's a lot more melodically and harmonically complex than you know a lot of other music that is. I mean, there's plenty of cool music genres. I'm not going to gate keep or anything, but yeah, I mean I think it is. I I am the keep off the metal gate. Um, metal gate sounds like some kind of some but yeah, I mean, um, I think it's pretty cool. I I listened to a bit of the bit of the old Dream Theater. That's a that's always a fun time. But yeah, I I also I think when I really got into it was like metal Ecalypse, which is funny. Yeah, you know it's it was this parody cartoon. It was that this is spinal Tap except a cartoon. Yeah, genuinely genuinely kick as music. Yeah, And there's like an appreciation for all the different metal bands that do like guest vocals and guest appearances on the shows and stuff. But I do love that It's just every episode is just really roasting this band for trying to be you know, metal um and just how stupid that looks. It's like, what does it even mean? Yeah, which a great show. Let me just talk about that for now. Someone gets impaled and they're like, that's that's super metal. But we're kind of that's sort of what we're going to talk about today because we're talking about animals who have infused themselves with metal and they're literally metal. And when I say literally, it isn't in the literal sense of the word literal, because they have metal in their bodies. So spiders already, we're already metal. I think once we start talking about spiders and other flesh eating arthropods like deer ticks or even fiber shredding insects like leaf cutter ants, all have one thing in common their literal metal heads. So arthur pods invertebrates that include spiders, ants, wasps, and more often incorporate heavy metals into their fings in order to strengthen their bite, including manganese, zinc, and copper, and recently, physicists have been studying how these heavy metals helped strengthen their fings so they like took all of these mandibles stuck them under a microscope, and we're like, yeah, it's pretty metal. There's a lot of metal in there. I want to be that kind of scientist. I think it's really fitting that all of these animals you just mentioned are extremely metal. Yeah, like, what's what's more metal than a spider? That's just that's metal as hell. That's a Cannibal Corpse album cover come to life, and like wasps. Wasps do crazy things like like paralyzed the other animals and leggs and them and stuff. It's they're all like the most over the top metal lyrics become creatures basically right exactly. It's like they're aware of it. They're aware of their own reputations. So like we got to ingest more metal so that we're even more metal, both both literally and figuratively. Yeah, they they lean into it. So research at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory UH and Oregon State looked at spider things and scorpions, stingers, as well as ant mandibles at the atomic level, which I love that they're just like, I gotta jar scorpions, stingers and ant mandibles. I'm doing gonna go do some science with it. They're looking at it at the atomic level too. They're like no, no, no, we gotta go deeper right right, really really see what makes the scorpion stinger tick. Yeah, it's like, yeah, that's a scorpion stinger, all right. Um, they found it. They found that the heavy metals were interlaced among proteins into a very strong composite material that they call a heavy element bio material. And so it's basically like a protein metal alloy. So a fusion of like meat stuff and metal stuff that creates a sort of like armor that gives these insects and arthur pods a huge mechanical advantage. So they can like puncture really hard material. So if you're a deer tick and you want to bude a nice deer butt, deer height is actually pretty tough, so they need strong mandibles to be able to you bite a deer or like a leaf cutter ant, like biting through a thick leaf. Like you're just a little guy. You're this tiny ant. You have the teeny tiny muscles if you're if you're like aunt's size, like a leaf is like as thick as your fist. I never thought about that before. That's like, that's like biting through a phone book. Yeah, exactly exactly, which have tried. Uh, it wouldn't recommend a little pulpy well to fibrous mouth gets all sore. Yeah. Um, and then you don't have the numbers anymore, and it's like, oh, I got a call plumber. Let's just not to make the exact joke. Then I can't find the plumbers anywhere. Um. So they're like cyborgs, like they're like sent from the future to destroy the past. I mean it seems like they were sent from the past to chill out during the future. Oh that's cool. That's that's more chill. I like that version of the Terminator right right, He's like, I am from the past and now I am in you have to hang out. Yeah, it's like I am from the past and now I'm in the future. It's like, yeah, that is that is how time works. Yes. Yeah. They suddenly realizes it's not as impressive and just gets really mechanically depressed depressed. Yeah, I thought it was cooler than it was in my head. It sounded a lot cooler, but I said it and now I feel kind of dumb. Well of those dudes at a party. That's like, you think about it, we'll all time to I've like, were all on the planets, spaceship Earth. Yeah, the time machine is Earth yeah time yeah wow wow wow yeah. But yeah no they are. I mean, you know, I guess if your definition of cyborg is has metal in in your body, then sure yes, And well you said it's like a there was like a fiber mix. It's like flesh binding with metal. That sounds like a cyborg to me. It sounds very so, I mean it's almost cooler in a way than like cyborgs, right, because the cyborg to me is half your face is flash and then you shove some electrodes on there and some diodes and a metal plate, maybe a metal eyeball. But like with this, it's like at the like basically molecular level, their proteins are interlaced with the metal. It's biomaterial, this heavy element biomaterial as they call it. So it's more like when Jeff Goldbloom gets fused with the teleporter at the end of the fly right, right, and he's just like starts vomiting nuts and bolts. Yeah, what happens. There's definitely vomiting in that scene, and then what's her name gives birth to a toaster that was that was a good movie, Davis. Yeah, yeah, and she's like, oh my god, and it's like this toaster, small flying toaster with Jeff Goldbloom's hair. That'd be great. Yeah, I love that. So arthropods aren't the only animals who have metal mouths. There are some animals who use iron to fortify their body parts. Famously, beaver teeth are infused with iron for strength, which gives them. Yeah, that's what gives them these orange just yellow color. Like if you've ever seen beaver teeth, they're kind of nasty looking their orange. And that's not because they're dirty that they don't brush, which now I'm imagining, well I would love I mean in a way because they're stripping bark all that time. That seems like that's you got to have some Yeah, it feels like plaque would have trouble hanging a right. I mean, like their teeth grow constantly and they wear them down, So I don't think plaque stands a chance. But yeah, the the iron rich plants they consume gives them the materials they need to build these iron infused teeth, and I'm having like my mind is is being blown with this. Um. So if you can eat stuff that's iron and like rich and iron, and it's like literally iron, yeah, I mean we eat we we also like incorporate iron in our bodies, Like maybe not to this extent, but yeah when you eat, when you like, we need some of these metals in our diet. I guess I never wow, I mean, of course obviously, like why else would they call it iron? I just it's one of those things that I just never thought about, I guess, so until you're until I learned that beavers eat enough of it that it makes their teeth metal. I mean like for us, iron is used in our hemoglobin. It's like in our in our blood, our transport molecules for like oxygen involves iron. Uh. And so if you're sometimes people who don't have enough iron, that can actually cause a type of anemia. So like, yeah, we actually really depend on this metal. Yeah, so in a way, we're all cyborgs. In a way, we're all cyborgs, which I think should unite us, you know, honestly. Yeah, Yeah, that's the new flesh beaver and human and and talking together all hand in hand skipping down the street. Wouldn't that be nice? Beavers and humans? I've seen it. You know, beavers and humans do share some things in common. We both are basically terraform things and are alternate environment and we do bend the environment to our wills, right, Like beavers create marsh lands where there wasn't any humors, destroy ecosystems. That's true. I mean beavers are a little better than humans. I would say, like because they're like, because they're not driving, they're not driving pickup trucks to the to the beaver dam to do this, carbon footprints smaller, right, because they are like, I made a marsh and we're like, well, I made a bed, bathroom beyond. So you know that's true. Yeah, less less fish can live in the bathroom some, but not as many some. But in terms of the iron in the mouth, beavers are not the older one. Another animal which has perhaps my favorite name of all the animals in the world, called the wandering meat loaf. Have you heard of the wandering meat loaf? I'm just all I can think of is is meat loaf the singer looking for his car? Right, all I can think of I would do when singing for the car food found it anyway, but I won't eat iron. I don't know. But yeah, so I've never heard of the sands. The Wandering meat Loaf also known as the gum boot Kiten, which is also a goofy name. It's like, alright, wandering meat loaf is a little silly. Let's let's give it a more formal name, like the gum boot Kiten Kiten is chill right. That makes me think like it's like a bug or like a lobster or something lobster closer. So, it is a mollusk who kind of looks like a loaf of meat. So if you want that first, that first link, will I can't wait to click on. Oh yeah, okay, just look like a meat loaf, does um? So yeah, it's it's a mollusk like a you know, like a sea snail. Like, um, there's god, I forgot all the mollusks. Well, this one looks like the end of a crust uh of bread. Really like, if you saw this in the water, you would not know that it was a creature. It looks like trash. No, it looks yeah, it does. It looks like um or fruitcake and an over baked fruitcake. Yes, yeah, yeah, but yeah, they are mollusks. They're related to snails, they're related to bivalves. It looks like an awful Christmas present. Looks like that's the one that you thanks for them. Great, God, what I've always wanted. M marzipan. Marzipan can be good, but typically it's not right. And this thing looks like a total marzapan. It's a little guy. It's it doesn't look delicious. Um it's radula. Oh, which is a tongue covered in teeth. So that's fun, right, it's radula. Uh so it is fortified with iron based minerals found in rocks, making them one of the hardest biomaterials produced by a living animal. It's tongue or the teeth on its tongue. I mean the tongue and the teeth are one and the same. It's like it's a tooth covered tongue. So yeah, that the teeth I mean, I guess if you're getting technical, yes, that the teeth on the tongue are the ones that are the hardest borrow material. Wow, I ate that one material the hardest biomaterial. The wandering meat loaf uses this iron rock tooth tongue to scrape algae off of rocks. So it's got this tooth covered tongue, the teeth got iron in it, and it scrapes algae off of rocks. That's pretty radula all I can. Did you ever see that show Channel zero? I think it's called It's like an anthology Horner show. In the first season, well, the sort of monster in it was just this thing that was entirely covered in teeth, and that's all I'm thinking. Oh yeah, no, I think pictures of that guy. Yeah yeah, I mean you know that's basically kind of sharks. They're covered in denticles, which are technically not teeth, but they're called like there. They are tooth like projections in their skin which are uh sharp actually, and it's why like shark skin. If you've ever pettish shark, it's kind of rough. Yeah yeah, yeah sure. And the shark and Jaws too, rubs somebody the wrong way and it makes and they get hurt by it. So that's how I know that In Jaws too, that happens. Yeah. Wow, they really tried there, didn't they a little bit? The only thing I think the thing I think the shark also roars and eats a helicopter, like, don't for too much praise a little a little less scientific on the roaring part. And also the helicopter, well, hello was the helicopter. It was one of those c helicopters. Yeah, one of those helicopters. Yeah, absolutely, yeah, you know it's like the little things. You can land it on water. It's like a contoon helicopter. Yeah, yeah, is that a thing? Really? John boat helicopter and the dude flying and it had a real seventies neck beard, so maybe that contributed to it. Well maybe the sharks just policing sort of hairstyles and I can't blame it for that, that's true. Yeah, but yeah, so teeth covered tongue, tooth like projection covered skin, it exists. Your nightmares are real cool. I always suspected that they were. Uh, like my mom would tell me otherwise, but I knew no, Yeah, it's like, don't worry, like, you know, tooth covered animal like I'm wandering meat loaf with a tooth tongue doesn't exist. It's like, oh no, it doesn't exist very much. Yes, I was one of those kids that would get scared of real things like like war and serial killer. I mean that's very persipicacious, Like that's very you couldn't. You couldn't really like I couldn't be comforted by like there's no such thing as Yeah, there's no such thing as war. Yeah, I was. My number one fear was death. So that was a tough one for my parents. Yep, I had that. I had that middle of the night conversation as well. Yeah, where it's like I'm afraid of dying and they're like, oh, sweetie, you're not going to die. It's like, I'm afraid of you dying. Um probably won't happen, right right, is waking my mom up in the middle of the night. I'm scared of death. I'm scared of the inevitability of death. What does it all mean? It's relentlessly coming towards me. Yeah, And I would I would be like, I would explict this thing of like, well, like if death happens at some point, what are we doing? And my parents were just like, oh, sweetie, you know, just live every day. And I mean, what, like, what else could you say? Honestly, No, there was I mean they definitely they got me treatment for my crippling anxiety. But what you say in the moment is just like a little little guy, don't worry about it. You're not going to die anytime soon. How do you know? Yeah, yeah, it's like a do you off for Christmas? Little scovers. Sant is gonna die. No, Santa is not real. Oh um, Santa is a concept and uh, he will only die once there is the heat death of the universe. So we've talked about metal metal mouths, mouths with metals, uh, tongues with teeth that are made out of metal, which is fun. And now we're gonna talk about metal feet. So uh, let's talk about the scaly footed snail, which is a very wild looking snail. If you would be so okay, click on basic Yeah, I'm clicking on the link right now because I got to see what a snail with feet looks like. Well, I got it looks terrible. I have news for you. All snails have a foot. Uh, it's just a flat part like when you when you look at the snail and it's got just that flat part you see on the snail that's just called its foot. And imagine that your foot being three quarters the length of your body. Yeah, well you know, imagine your body being inside like that's true. Well, you grow eyeballs, many other concepts to wrestle with snail. So they are they definitely look like they are prepared to go to war. Um and makes the kind of war though, war against things that are that they could just kind of walk over. Yeah, yeah, like the kicking war. Yes, the sort of slow gooch ing over you war. But yeah, like they's what. It looks kind of like a couch ball. Yeah, they do look like couch balls. They are. They grow around two inch is are five centimeters long, but they're not. Okay, so I can still defeat it if I need to, you could, Yes, despite their relatively small size, they look extremely well protected because it looks like, I mean, have you seen like acrylic nails. Yeah, it looks like a bunch of very tiny acrylic nails all sort of stacked together on there around you know. Yeah, this is this is like a specific phobia I think some people probably have, is contained entirely on this creature's foot, right, like a bunch of fingers. Like we talked about things covered in teeth, teeth like things, and these are covered in like fingernail like projections, does anything eat this snail? Because I gotta feel like if I was a predator in this thing's sort of weight class, I'd look at the stay and be like, that's not worth it. There maybe, but I think they are white difficult to make a snack of, because yeah, there there may in fact be a predator that manages to sort of like you know, knock them over and try to get at them from the underside. But it's it's a challenge for sure. First of all, where it lives, it is a very tough area, one of the toughest environments in the world. They live near hydrothermal vents, so it can face temperatures of up to seven and fifty degrees fahrenheit or four hundred degrees celsius. So you know, it's not it's not the easiest place to live. They're super nearly so that foot, that fleshy appendage on the bottom of the snails is covered in hard scales, and they come in a variety of fun exterior colors like black, brown, gold, and white, while their fleshy insides are usually a dark reddish color. Um, Yeah, they look they look kind of collectible. Yes, there's like little spiky hummels. Got yeah, yeah, exactly, you know, like I got the golden scally footed snails um and actually put these things on eBay. The different colors are interesting because they are due to the different chemical compositions of the hydrothermal vents the snails live by and which compounds they absorb. So you can like tell which hydrothermal vent they live by by the color that the snail is. Does each vent have its own like color? Is that how they Is that how scientists track them vent? I mean they I think that they track it by the chemical compositions. But probably the same reason that these snails are these different colors, you do see, there's probably some of those colors involved around that hydrothermal event as well. Um, although I do like the idea that the event is just like spewing like exactly the same color, it might be similar. It's like somebody getting slimed at the kids castle, where it's down there just this jet of green constantly. So due to their incredibly scaly appearance, they are also called the sea pegul in. Uh. Pengulins are that mammal that have those sort of large scales. They kind of look like living pine cones. It's it still feels like a bit of a deep cut because it's like, you know, how many like you're like already an obscure animal and you're comparing it to another obscure animal. You're like, yes, just imagine this deep sea hydrothermal vent snail like the pangolin and you know, everyone's favorite familiar animal. So the reason these are metal, it's not just because of how they look where they look like, you know, death pine cones. It's that they are able to use the iron sulfide spewing out of the events and incorporated into their tough shells and scales. And it's the only known animal in the world to use iron in its skeleton or in this case, exoskeleton. HM. They can also use pyrite and greg, which just sounds like some guy named Greg discovered this and it was like, ah, yeah, this is greg eite. Now I found it's Greg. Somebody looks at They're going to think of this space space. This is Greg's rock. Don't nobody forget it. So, yeah, they use pirate and greg in building their shells, the ladder of which actually makes them magnetic. So Greg Greg's rock is also magnetic, I guess, which is cool. That's good to have your name. Yeah, I like that they are magnetics. So you could like take one and kind of like stick it on your fridge. Yeah, I wouldn't be happy about it, for sure. I could use it to hang up my artwork in my math tests. Your drawing of your your little drawings drawings of of meat loaf looking for his car. It's like it's like you just draw sort of a brown cube and it's like, well, what is this. It's like, you know, the wandering meat loaf. Okay, you guys know. It's like the pendulum. You guys know. You guys know. Um. In order to survive near the vents and obtain nutrients, they rely on a symbiotic relationship with bacteria who are able to do chemosynthesis, because it is very hard to find nutrients down there. A lot of it is stuff that is basically inorganic, like it can't be eaten by a typical animal, and so attitude. I know, if you really put your mind to it, you can puff a hydrothermal vent um. But yeah, the bacteria can do chemosynthesis. They can break down these chemicals in their byproduct can be eaten used as nutrients by the snails and other life forms, so that you can actually form these food chains down near the hydrothermal vent. And it's all thanks to essentially like bacteria often living inside of these animals. That is wacky. It's something I thought of earlier when you mentioned there's probably some predator that's like developed or evolved specifically to eat this thing. Just generally, it's a crazy where like life will just like life is so stubborn. I get sort of forming like next to volcanic vents at the bottom of the like why go find something, goes find some myself. It's easier to live in, Like Nope, this is our spot. We're gonna make this work. Yeah, I mean I guess that. I guess from what I can tell. The predators of the snail are things like crabs and venomous snails, so uh yeah, it's just like if they can like puncture through their weird scaly exterior, they can get at that nice soft, squashy meat. Probably delicious, I don't know. I feel like it would have a pecan taste due to all of the chemicals in bacteria, all the volcanic metals right on the iron sulfide, it's kind of radioactive. So Tom, earlier you were mentioning wasps, which I thought was very interesting because you were foreshadowing, uh, what we're going to talk about later, and you didn't even know it. Very interesting because you are a wasps. Many people don't know this. So we're going to talk about a parasitoid wasp called Apocrypta who is very picky about the nursery she chooses for her young So something you want to be choosy about. Yeah, I mean, yeah, you know, like you can't just be up any random animals. But um, so, uh, you had mentioned like there are, oh, there are these wasps that will like legs on things and paralyze them, and that is true. There's like the tarantula hawk, which is a parasitoid wasp that uses like uses tarantula as a host and it's really terrifying and it's the most metal thing probably in the animal kingdom indeed. And this is a similar wasp and it's metal in multiple ways. So the there is another wasp. So there's the wasp that were ultimately going to talk about the Apo Crypto. But let's pull put a pin in that wasp and then talk about another wasp. So the fig wasp lays its larva inside a butting fig. Uh. Fig wasps come in many different species. They are teeny teeny tiny, they're around two millimeters big. They are smaller than an ant. In fact, they can be eaten by ants, So they're they're the world's cutest wasps. I'm gonna say in figs, imagine getting one of those ships. I mean, wait for it. Uh. So it's like the worst kinder egg. I mean you may if you eat the species of figs that these wasps are all about, there's a very good chance you've eaten wasp and not even known it. So there are goal wasps. So this means that it lays its eggs in the flesh of a plant, and the plant is induced to form a goal, which is a kind of round cyst which protects and nourishes the larva. In the case of fig wasps, the females will actually squeeze their way into the opening of an immature fig lay her eggs and often die in the process because she's like squeezing through this very tiny opening. Uh. And she'll like lose her wings she's just like dragging herself in and parts of her just like coming off as she's dragging herself through this fig um, and then she lays her eggs and then she's just like, all right, I give up and die. I mean, who among us I wouldn't get to the end of that ordeal and just feel like, you know what, I'm done? This, This this fig is my tomb. Yeah, and it is also I don't eat figs anymore. Well, her body simply remains and is actually absorbed by the fruit. So if you eat a species of fig pollinated by these wasp species, you may also be eating dead wasp jelly. Essentially, it's just like gets sort of absorbed into the fig. Actually, you know, the only fig I've ever actually eaten is the fig and a fig Newton, and you know that's processed foods. There's probably other insects, and absolutely there's probably more like more insects, more insects than that. So I don't know what I'm getting on my high horse about with these figs. But again, they've never eating a wasp before. These are so tiny, they're like smaller than an ant. So I mean, like, I'm not so fust if I eat an ant, so I I'll still eat figs. So these types of fig wasps actually do help the fig because they are pollinating the fig plant. And so the relationship between the fig and the wasp can be described as mutualism. The wasp gets a nutritious nursery for its young, it gets a great tomb to die in. I'm gonna say it could be a little more mutual, like the fig could get a bigger door, uh and the well. But because the door is so small, it protects her young from potential predators. And then the fig gets that sweet sweet pollination um. And by the fig, you die by the fig exactly it is. It's the code, the code of the wasps. So the fig is targeted by multiple pollinator wasps. And so once inside the fig, the newly hatched wasps can actually mate with one another like they just they're like they're in there and they're having a good time. Um. And once they are done having an orgy inside the fig, the male wasps will actually start to chew their way out of the plant. And apparently this whole ordeal of chewing out of the plant is so hard they just die and the females will literally use them as a doormat on their way out of the fig. What what a life incredible right, you die climbing into this fig, lay the eggs, all the half of the eggs hatch and just die trying to chew their way out, and the other half that do get out will just die flying into different things again. Live by the fig, die by the fig. I think it's very is perfect hardcore. There are other types of fig wasps who aren't so mutualistic with the fig. Instead of climbing inside and dying like a chump, they inject their larva into the flesh of the plant with a long ovipositors. So no ova positor is like this long syringe that insects will or arthropods will use to lay eggs. They can sometimes even um use other wasps galls in order to place their own eggs without even pollinating the plant. So this brings us to Apocrypto, the Apocrypto wasp genus, who are a bunch of species of wasps who have a very fierce looking needle coming off their butt. Uh. And this thing looks like a stinger, like this really long menacing stinger, but it's it is an ovipositor um. It lays eggs, and yet it is actually extremely menacing. So it can be over twice the length of the wasps body. They can't bring it onto an airplane, no uh, And it has to be yeah, So it's like it's like it's huge. It's like way over twice the length of the wasp body. And it has to be this long to be able to pierce the thick flesh of a fig and to find its target. And it's also very thin, so it's very long and thin. It's like a fifth the diameter of the average human hair, and it is highly flexible. And so for something like this to actually be able to like drill into a fig, it has to be really extremely tough because it is so tiny, so to be tough enough for the job. Some species of these wasps have been found to have metal in their ovipositors. So researchers at the Indian Institute of Science and Bangalore found that the wasp syringe tip is plated in zinc to keep it sturdy and durable. And when you look at like microscopic images of it, it really looks very like a tool of torture. Uh, it's look at it under a microscope and it's literally just taped to switch blades. I mean, you're not too far from the truth. So, uh, the ovipositor drills into the flesh of the fig with these two teeny tiny sharp zinc enforced serrated blades which move back and forth again like together to like sort of stab walk into the flash of the fig. And this allows the wasp to slowly sometimes it takes them up to an hour, uh, stab their way through the tough, unripe fig. It's my favorite form of exercise is a nice frisk stab walk stab. That's how. That's how like Freddie and Jason like get there, get their exercise, you know, get the cardio. You gotta get that cardio, you know. Um and I would love that, like so you know how, like celebrities will release their like workout tapes like what out with with Jason twelve machete twelve machete swings, three rips right right, we have fun here, but it's all about health as he's stabbing a teenager. Um. So there is also some research that suggests that certain apocryptos species can use their metal butt syringe also as a nose to sniff out where the larva of other wasps live, so they can lay their eggs on a pollinator wasps larva where her young will eat the other babies. And uh yeah, so it's like they've got this like ovipositor that's sensitive to carbon dioxide and so it may actually be able to like detect the breathing of these other babies and then like drill down with its metal plated tip and then deposit the egg on these other larva and then that egg hatches and matures more quickly and then eats these So this this is kind of the this wasp is kind of the scumbag wasp. Yeah, that's the vibe I'm getting pretty much. I mean, you can really like the difference in sort of lifestyles is quite stark, where you have these wasps that are quite uh self punishing, where it's like I'm gonna squeeze myself to death into this fig, lay my eggs, die my offspring, We'll go find other newly hatched wasps inside the fig and then the males will like become dead doormats for the females, who themselves go out only to squeeze themselves into a fig and dies, and then this other one's like, I'm gonna stab this fig. I'll find your baby stab that too, and then my baby will eat your baby. Yeah, it's way less work, man, You should try it my way. I kind of imagine these like other wasps with their with their SUVs driving around with a bumper sticker of like my child would eat your child, My child ate your child. Well, before we go, Tom, we got play a little game. It's called the Mystery Animal Sound Game. Every week I pick a mystery animal sound and you the listener, and you the gifts, trying to guess who is squawking. So, last week's mystery animal sound hint was this up up up, I messed up. Sorry. The last week's mystery animal sound hint was this is one cool chick. Uh So, Tom, who do you think is squawking? There? Baby penguin? You are correct, That is absolutely all right. It is a baby Emperor penguin. Congratulations to Anti, be, Ozzie and gin w who all gets correctly. The fastest. Baby penguins will make this sound to get their parents to feed them freshly regurgitated fish. A baby when I want vomit fish sticks into my face just how you like them, So you don't have to show I like him the way I like him like you know, you know what you like. So baby penguins must survive extreme frigid temperatures and are covered in a fluffy down that helps trap heat Emperor Penguin's huddle for warmth and large colonies. The gentle pushing and shoving in the huddle creates a wave of penguin bodies and a rotation which allows penguins to cycle through being in the toasty center, giving everyone a chance to warm up. So it's basically a fluffy cyclone of penguins all managing to sort of whirlpool into the center and then getting shoved out. It's like a mosh pit, but sudhit. I want to be in a mosh pit with baby penguins to man, I dominate. I just kick those penguins, swinging my wallet chain or any incredible Happy Tom goes to penguin moshpit parentheses and he wins, Yeah, man, dominate those penguins. I've never been more sure of anything in my life. Would not be hard to dominate baby penguins. Just trying to tap dance, just cute little like Elijah Wood's penguin tap and dance, and Tom just like kick them punts them right into the water. Listen, man, that's how I do. When you feel, when you start feeling that music, when you start feeling in music, you start kicking in penguin, you start kicking penguins, un penguins. Now where this is all in jest. It's all in jest. If anyone like took us seriously, as like bought plane tickets to go to the Arctic, it's like, while I gotta go down in the Antarctic, beat up some emperor penguins. Don't do it. No, you spent a lot of way too much money on this bit, if you, um so, you said that was last week's clue that is, and now we're going on to this week's Mr Animal sound. Here is the hint. It says, if this little guy has stolen the voice of another animal, huh is it a parrot? Interesting? That's a no, And he guesses I'm trying to think he said stolen the voice of another animal? Um, I already said parrot. Ah. I don't know, man, what else mimics? I don't have a deep enough knowledge of the animals. Wait, don't why did I have you on this podcast? I don't know. I don't know anything. You didn't you didn't study for the quiz and you're not wearing pants. Well that's just my normal sunday. Um. I don't know. Is it is it? Is it some kind of is it something? Like? Something in my mind is being like, oh, it's probably something scary. That's like trying to sound like it's cute. I don't know why my brain is thinking that. I guess because because of the episode we just had. Uh if it's so, it's I'm thinking it's like some kind of horrible bug. It's like trying to trick things. Yeah, well that's interesting. Interesting. I'm not going to tell you because you'll have to find out on next week's episode of Creature Feature. That's how I get you. That's how I get you. That's how you get the the stab walk hooks in. That's how I stabbed people with my ovipositor. I should get I should go to jail for saying that. I almost said. I almost said that, and that's why I started right. You didn't want to go to that. I feel like I don't know if you could hear of and in the background, I just heard like a Carabinieri siren and it's like, well, there I go, go to Italy jail. Yep, they heard me. Well, Tom, thank you so much for joining me today. Yeah, no, thanks for having me on this fun. Can you tell the people where they can find you? Sure? I have a Patreon. It's a podcast network that I co host with my buddy Dave Bell. We're both ex crack folks, like Katie. That's patreon dot com, slash game fully unemployed, that's g A M E f U l L Y unemployed. We do all sorts of shows and stuff over there with a bunch of other of our friends. So give that listen, do it. That's it. That's all I got. It's very good sometimes when I'm on there and I like to absolutely derail their show and it's very funny. I appreciate you didn't return the favor. It was very nice of you. I think it would have been worse if Dave had been here too. The episode would have been twice as long. We make a game out of it on like Alex's show. But yeah, this is a lot of fun. Yeah, yeah, absolutely, it's great to have you on UM. And hey people, if you think you know the answer to the Mr Animal sound game, or you have a question, or you want to show me pictures of your wandering meat loaf. Wait, no, don't do that. That is not an indication. No sirens are starting up again. Wow, I'm going to jail for two times. UM. Now you can email me at Creature Feature Pod at gmail dot com. Please don't send me emails of your wandering meat loave. I don't want to see it. Um. But yes questions, yes to questions, yes to cats or dogs, and yes to answers to the Mr Animal sound game. And thank you so much for listening. If you leave a rating, a review, I will be eternally grateful. I'll print it out, rub it all over my face, chew on it. Just really, you know what I mean, into it like a phone book, right exactly. Take a big old bite out of it. Uh, you know, with my big old metal teeth. And thanks to the Space Classics where they're super awesome. Song exo Luminous Creature features of production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts like the one you just heard, visit the I Heard Radio app Apple Podcasts or Hey, guess what, Wherever you listen to your favorite shows, even if you shove your face against a wandering meat loaf, and that's how you do it. I don't I don't care, I don't judge. See you next Wednesday,